Mediagazer: BitTorrent shuts down its live streaming website to refocus on mobile (Janko Roettgers/Gigaom)

8:20 AM ET, February 21, 2014

Top News:

BBC:

Venezuela threatens to expel CNN over protest coverage — Venezuela's President Nicolas Maduro has threatened to expel the US news network CNN from the country over its reporting of recent protests there. — Mr Maduro said he would take action if CNN did not “rectify its coverage”.

Discussion: @fieldproducer, Caracas Chronicles and TIME

Uri Friedman / The Atlantic Online:
Why Venezuela's Revolution Will Be Tweeted

Discussion: @valtmc, @hemlockmartinis and @anupkaphle

Danny O'Brien / Electronic Frontier Foundation: Venezuela's Internet Crackdown Escalates into Regional Blackout

Keith J. Kelly / New York Post:

Gannett blog shuts down after almost 7 years — Gannett Blog, a nonprofit site being run by an ex-Gannett editor, has shut down after nearly seven years. — The site was launched by Jim Hopkins, a former reporter and editor at USA Today, and was probably the foremost tracker of the tumult …

Discussion: Gannett Blog and SFist

Pew Internet:

Mapping Twitter Topic Networks: From Polarized Crowds to Community Clusters — Summary of Findings — Polarized Crowds: Political conversations on Twitter — Conversations on Twitter create networks with identifiable contours as people reply to and mention one another in their tweets.

Discussion: Quartz, Des Moines Register, The Technology Chronicles, PBS, Al Jazeera America, The Switch and CNET

Michael Calia / Wall Street Journal:

Dish Profit Up as Subscriber Rolls Grow; EchoStar Profit Falls — Dish Network Corp. said its fourth-quarter profit jumped 38% as it added subscribers to both its pay-TV and broadband services. — Dish, which has faced tough competition from pay-TV rivals as well as the proliferation …

Discussion: Reuters, Business Wire, Reuters, Bloomberg, WKRB News and NASDAQ.com

Peter Kafka / Re/code:

Sources say Amazon readying a Web TV box competing with Apple TV and Roku, for March rollout — Amazon Gets Its TV Box Ready, Again — Amazon is gearing up to take on Apple and Roku, again. — Industry sources say Amazon is getting ready to launch a Web TV box that would compete …

Discussion: TechCrunch and The Verge

Vladimir Kozlov / Hollywood Reporter:

Russian Rights Holders File First-Ever Collective Lawsuit Against Online Video Service — The move is expected to create a new precedent in fighting piracy. — MOSCOW — Several leading Russian movie and TV companies have filed the first ever collective lawsuit against an online video service …

Lily Kuo / Quartz:

A Chinese tycoon is close to buying a bygone icon of American capitalism — A Chinese conglomerate on a global buying spree is reportedly in talks to buy Forbes Media—although for much less than the Forbes family has been hoping. Fosun International—which most recently bought JP Morgan's …

Discussion: @christinelu and Fortune

Andrew Wallenstein / Variety:

‘House of Cards’ Binge-Watching: 2% of U.S. Subs Finished Entire Series Over First Weekend — Binge-watching on the rise compared to drama series' first season — There are some dedicated “House of Cards” fans out there. — Approximately 2% of Netflix subscribers on U.S. broadband networks took …

Discussion: @theaafca, TIME, @awallenstein, Fox Business, @awallenstein and The Verge

Guardian:

Rebekah Brooks 'not aware of hacker's contract while she was NoW editor' — Ex-editor tells Old Bailey that Glenn Mulcaire deal, which paid him £92,000 in 2001, was arranged without her knowledge — Rebekah Brooks was not aware of the annual contract the News of the World had with Glenn Mulcaire …

Discussion: BBC

Janko Roettgers / Gigaom:

BitTorrent shuts down its live streaming website to refocus on mobile — BitTorrent Inc. is shutting down its P2P-powered live streaming website by the end of the month, according to an email BitTorrent co-founder Bram Cohen sent out to users late Wednesday.

Mark Sweney / Guardian:

In UK, Amazon takes on Netflix by combining LoveFilm video-on-demand with Prime for £79 a year — Amazon takes on Netflix with rebrand of LoveFilm video-on-demand service — Online retailer will fold film and TV rental arm into its Prime subscription service for combined price of £79 a year

Discussion: The Independent, Telegraph, TechRadar.com, Telegraph, TechRadar.com, Daily Mail, Wired.co.uk, The Next Web, Pocket-lint and Engadget

Om Malik / Gigaom:

Om Malik leaves day-to-day operations at Gigaom, becomes full partner at True Ventures, site raises $8M more — Now that Gigaom is all grown up, it's time for the next chapter — It's a new year (although it's well underway) and I'm excited to talk about the new phase at Gigaom.

Discussion: Om Malik, Re/code, @alexia, @kentgoldman, @waltmossberg, @tomkrazit, @om, @jason_pontin, @timoreilly, @twittner, TechCrunch, PE Hub Blog, Pulse 2.0, @nitashatiku, @johnolilly, @hblodget, @laurengoode, @carr2n, @satishd, @mims, @pkafka, @rafat, @pkedrosky, @ashleymayer, @msquinn, @thekenyeung, @caseynewton, @mikeisaac and @tonysphere

Henry Taylor / TheMediaBriefing:

Contributoria catch up Q&A: how the first month went — Described as “if Kickstarter and Medium had a baby”, crowd-funded journalism community Contributoria is now one month old. — The Guardian Media Group-backed startup has signed up more 650 members - 65 percent of which are writers - and 24 projects have been backed.

Discussion: @mattmcalister

Joseph Lichterman / Nieman Journalism Lab:

News video curator Watchup will update app in March to incorporate ads, add PostTV as partner — Right back after these messages: Watchup adds ads and partners with The Washington Post — The news video aggregator Watchup aims, in a sense, to recreate something like the traditional …

Discussion: Idea Lab, Venture Capital Dispatch, @niemanlab and @crovitz

Susan Currie Sivek / Mediashift:

How First Look Pushes Verticals Ahead of Overarching ‘Magazine’ Brand — First Look Media has gotten plenty of coverage for its strategy of creating “digital magazines” based on the work of specific journalists with unique voices who will dive deeply into focused topics.

Discussion: @pbsmediashift and New York Times

Maryclaire Dale / Associated Press:

Rivals debate auction rules for Philly newspapers … PHILADELPHIA (AP) — The top investor in Philadelphia's largest newspapers wants the company sold in a quick, closed auction among current partners while a rival wants a slower sale open to all. — The Philadelphia Inquirer …

Discussion: Philadelphia Magazine

Jon Chesto / Boston Business Journal:

Patch's move to bring back laid-off editor is a sign that the firm is hiring journalists again — When Susan Petroni learned on Jan. 29 that she would lose her job as Framingham editor for the Patch network of news sites, the news didn't come as a big shock.

Julian Hattem / The Hill:

FCC: ‘No intention’ of muzzling press — The Federal Communications Commissions (FCC) is trying to reassure House Republicans that it has no plans to restrict the freedom of the press. — In a letter released Thursday, FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler told Republican leaders of the House Energy …

Discussion: Poynter, Hit & Run, Hot Air, @sodagrrl and Mediaite